Numerous online websites, applications and other Internet-accessible programs can provide databases of information for businesses or other location entities. Known examples include web search engines (e.g., “Google Search”) or mapping applications (e.g., “Google Maps”) offered by Google, Inc. and others, business review websites hosted by Yelp, Inc. or others, and still further online services. These online services rely on and document the hours of operation for businesses and other location entities. Operating hours generally correspond to the daily, weekly or monthly patterns of when a business or other location entity is open. Changes in operating hours can arise from a variety of circumstances, including but not limited to shortening or extending an opening time or a closing time. Businesses can also open or close without properly updating these changes in databases of information for the business.
Creating and maintaining a comprehensive database of accurate operating hours for all businesses can be significantly expensive. Contacting every business in, for example, the United States to inquire about their hours would be very labor intensive, particularly if the process is regularly repeated to detect changes in business hours. At the same time, records of business hours are often relied upon by users of search engines, so incorrect records can be inconvenient to the user. Accordingly, there is a need for a relatively low-cost, accurate technique for identifying the operating hours of businesses and other location entities.